#gonchivetta

[wolfbuns]

I'm glad the tumblrinas have caught on to Goncharov because I've been meaning to talk about one of the most underrated games of all time: Goncharov the Videogame (2007) by Vivendi Games.

No one ever talks about this game. Sure, it was one of the many GTA clones of that era, and the driving and shooting sections were attrocious, but the atmosphere of this game was immaculate, and it did so many incredible things ahead of it's time. A build-your-empire game, where you play as Goncharov, showing you the behind the scenes of his rise-to-power in the streets of Naples, taking back territory against the Italian mafia. All the actors who were still alive reprised their roles, except for Pacino (they had to get the same impersonator who played him in the Scarface game), and they even did mocap for all the cutscenes, where they recreated key scenes from the movie from different perspectives.

Of course what people remember the most about this is the incredible mid-game twist. As you know there's not that many action setpieces in the movie, so after the 5 assassinations where does the game go? Well, as you know from the movie, Goncharov dies, but after the funeral scene, and a fake-out credits sequence, there is a 20 year timeskip and you now control a grown-up Gonchivetta, and you set out in a journey of revenge to reclaim your father's empire and clean up his honor. Of course in order to unlock Gonchivetta's story you needed to max out your affection with Katya before Assassination 3, a mechanic that was not properly explained anywhere in the game, and so the second half of the game remained mostly undiscovered for the next 15 years, with many of the low scores citing the seemingly short play time.

However, the final nail on the coffin was when nearing release of the game Matteo JWHJ 0715 was asked about the game in an interview and went on a 15 minute-long tirade against the entire gaming industry, fully denouncing the production of this game for not sticking to his vision, and claiming this was just a cash-grab set up by Warner Bros., who owned the licensing rights of the movie at the time. Many people cancelled their pre-orders and started boycotting the game, many gaming forums even having dozens of threads dedicated to discussing the ethics of purchasing the game after Matteo's declarations. Scorsese even had to make a statement for several gaming magazines asking people to support the game, but it was too late, and the game was a financial failure across all platforms.

Still, this game is fantastic, and I think it fully deserves a re-release or a full-on remake on current gen consoles. Activision just needs to settle with JWHJ 0715's estate and come to an agreement on the licensing. Maybe they can even include the Wii versions' improved aiming and vehicle driving, and the 2 extra missions and 15 songs for Gonchivetta's story that were added in the Xbox version. Maybe they can even get some of the talented people from Katya Team, the guys who are working on Goncharov Definitive Edition, the extensive fan patch aiming to fix and modernize the incredibly buggy PC release.